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amethyst73We saw Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix this past weekend. Unsurprisingly, it was a significantly better movie than the book. Rowling was starting to suffer from Writer's Fame (a disorder in which an author is so famous and sells so many copies that editors become less and less willing to edit their new books) at the time she wrote Book 4, which is presumably why it was so much longer than the previous three had been. The director of Movie 4 very sensibly cut out quite a bit of the book's material, and in my opinion the movie didn't particularly suffer for it. Book 5 is the longest book in the series thus far, and needed editing even more badly than Book 4 did; it's my least favorite of the series thus far, and (except for 6, which I haven't reread only due to a plethora of other things to read) the only book that I haven't bothered to reread, due primarily to the fact that I just didn't enjoy it very much.
Happily, the director for Movie 5 cut out lots of stuff. He also put in a few nice little modifications, most of which are not major, but do add nicely to the movie. It's not the best film of the series, but it's pretty good.
After the film, several of us went for dinner at a local chi-chi mall. Tasty food court food. We then went to CocoaBella for dessert, and are thinking that a visit there may be a requirement whenever we're in that part of the city. They sell a variety of very high-quality chocolates, generally with absolutely amazing fillings. The huz and I both chose a kind that had a strawberry, lemon, and thyme filling (called Kerry). The thyme was actually the strongest flavor of the bunch, followed by the fruit notes, and there was an interesting spice burn at the end of the mouthful. Our friends got ones with (1) tea, (2) violet, and (3) caramel with fleur-de-sel (3 individual chocolates). I tasted #1 and #3. The tea flavor is subtle, you have to kind of wait for it. And the caramel with fleur-de-sel starts off with a perfectly balanced salt-sweet mix, followed by a gentle caramel flavor. (Yes, I'm deliberately mimicking the BPAL-style reviews I've seen in several people's LJ entries!) All delightful, and all more than worth the $1.50 or less per piece. Yay, tasty chocolate!
Happily, the director for Movie 5 cut out lots of stuff. He also put in a few nice little modifications, most of which are not major, but do add nicely to the movie. It's not the best film of the series, but it's pretty good.
Much of what got cut was Harry being angry all the time. He's still angry and frustrated some in the film. But he's also badly frightened by his accidental contact with Voldemort's mind, and thus has pretty good reason to be frustrated when nobody will tell him anything or even offer much in the way of comfort. Happily, in the movie he figures out fairly quickly that Hermione and Ron are trying to help - and he responds positively. As a friend of ours put it, you didn't have to put up with text in all caps every two minutes.
Small changes that didn't affect the plot much but were just nice: (1) Neville got to be the one to discover the Room Of Requirement. Nice because he got to do something important to the plot. (2) Instead of having to introduce yet another minor character who then rats on the DA, they had Cho (under the influence of Veritaserum) give it away. Nice because it's a character that Harry knows and cares about, and is a good setup for Cho being less of a romantic interest later. (2a) Ginny was often onscreen and looking a little wistful when Harry was evincing interest in Cho.
Bigger change: At the end of the fight in the Ministry, having Voldemort actually possess Harry was a wonderfully logical extension of the psychic influence Voldemort had on Harry. It also made everyone who'd read the book sit up and pay attention. Cool idea, and very well implemented. :)
I didn't think much of the depiction of Bellatrix. In the book, she's totally cool, powerful, threatening, and frightening. In the film, her costume and makeup were too much like Elvira's, and her facial expression too uniformly manic to be anything but a goofy (albeit still dangerous) madwoman.
I was sorry they didn't leave Firenze in. But that's minor.
The very tag end of the film ('We have something to fight for. That's the difference between us and Voldemort.') felt kinda stupid.
Small changes that didn't affect the plot much but were just nice: (1) Neville got to be the one to discover the Room Of Requirement. Nice because he got to do something important to the plot. (2) Instead of having to introduce yet another minor character who then rats on the DA, they had Cho (under the influence of Veritaserum) give it away. Nice because it's a character that Harry knows and cares about, and is a good setup for Cho being less of a romantic interest later. (2a) Ginny was often onscreen and looking a little wistful when Harry was evincing interest in Cho.
Bigger change: At the end of the fight in the Ministry, having Voldemort actually possess Harry was a wonderfully logical extension of the psychic influence Voldemort had on Harry. It also made everyone who'd read the book sit up and pay attention. Cool idea, and very well implemented. :)
I didn't think much of the depiction of Bellatrix. In the book, she's totally cool, powerful, threatening, and frightening. In the film, her costume and makeup were too much like Elvira's, and her facial expression too uniformly manic to be anything but a goofy (albeit still dangerous) madwoman.
I was sorry they didn't leave Firenze in. But that's minor.
The very tag end of the film ('We have something to fight for. That's the difference between us and Voldemort.') felt kinda stupid.
After the film, several of us went for dinner at a local chi-chi mall. Tasty food court food. We then went to CocoaBella for dessert, and are thinking that a visit there may be a requirement whenever we're in that part of the city. They sell a variety of very high-quality chocolates, generally with absolutely amazing fillings. The huz and I both chose a kind that had a strawberry, lemon, and thyme filling (called Kerry). The thyme was actually the strongest flavor of the bunch, followed by the fruit notes, and there was an interesting spice burn at the end of the mouthful. Our friends got ones with (1) tea, (2) violet, and (3) caramel with fleur-de-sel (3 individual chocolates). I tasted #1 and #3. The tea flavor is subtle, you have to kind of wait for it. And the caramel with fleur-de-sel starts off with a perfectly balanced salt-sweet mix, followed by a gentle caramel flavor. (Yes, I'm deliberately mimicking the BPAL-style reviews I've seen in several people's LJ entries!) All delightful, and all more than worth the $1.50 or less per piece. Yay, tasty chocolate!
